System for separating a bottom plastic card from a stack of plastic cards

ABSTRACT

A system for separating a bottom plastic card includes a loading roller, on which a first end of the bottom plastic card rests, having a groove extending parallel to the axis of said loading roller. A movable assembly is disposed above the loading roller and includes a base and a loading wheel free to rotate. The base is moveable vertically between a contact position and a separated position. A return means constrains the movable assembly in the contact position. The base has an upstream wall upstream of the loading wheel and the bottom end of which is, in the contact position, at a distance from the loading roller less than the thickness of the bottom plastic card. The groove has an opening and a depth sufficient to enable the bottom plastic card&#39;s first end to descend in the groove so its first end passes under the upstream wall&#39;s bottom end.

The present invention relates to a system for separating plastic cards for a plastic-card processing machine, as well as a processing machine comprising such a separation system.

In the field of plastic cards, each plastic card must undergo one or more processing operations before being distributed. One processing may consist of a printing of patterns, photographs, characters, etc on one or two faces of the plastic card. Another processing may consist of a magnetisation of a magnetic track present on one face of the plastic card, or an initialisation of a chip present on one face of the plastic card.

A processing machine comprises a frame on which a reservoir is mounted containing the plastic cards to be processed, at least one processing module intended to process each plastic card, and a reception magazine containing the plastic cards being processed.

In order to separate the plastic cards from one another, the processing machine also comprises a separation system that is designed to take a plastic card from the reservoir, separating it from the rest of the stack.

The known separation systems require the fitting of manual adjustment means that are often complex and do not always give complete satisfaction, in particular because of the various thicknesses of plastic cards that may be placed in the reservoir.

One object of the present invention is to propose a separation system that does not have the drawbacks of the prior art and in particular remains efficient whatever the thickness of the plastic cards to be processed.

To this end, a system is proposed for separating a bottom plastic card from a stack of plastic cards, comprising:

-   -   a loading roller on which a first end of a bottom plastic card         rests, and having at least one groove extending parallel to the         axis of said loading roller, on its periphery and over its         entire length,     -   a movable assembly disposed above the loading roller and         comprising a base and a loading wheel mounted free to rotate on         the base, said base being able to move vertically between a         contact position in which the loading wheel is in contact with         the loading roller and a separated position in which the loading         wheel is at a distance from the loading roller, and     -   a return means designed to constrain said movable assembly in         the contact position,

the base having an upstream wall that extends upstream of the loading wheel and the bottom end of which is, in the contact position, at a distance from the loading roller less than the thickness of the bottom plastic card, and

the or each groove has an opening and a depth sufficient to enable the first end of the bottom plastic card to descend in said groove so that its first end passes under the bottom end of the upstream wall, the opening and the depth however remaining such that, despite the drop of the first end of the bottom plastic card, the first ends of the other plastic cards remain in abutment behind the upstream wall.

The invention also proposes a plastic-card processing machine comprising a chassis on which there are mounted a reservoir containing a stack of plastic cards to be processed, at least one processing module intended to process each plastic card, and a separation system according to the above variant and disposed between the reservoir and the or one of the processing modules.

Advantageously, the second ends of the plastic cards rest on a support of the reservoir that has an inclined slope that advances towards the separation system while descending.

The features of the invention mentioned above, as well as others, will emerge more clearly from a reading of the following description of an example embodiment, said description being given in relation to the accompanying drawings, among which:

FIG. 1 shows a separation system according to the invention before taking up a plastic card,

FIG. 2 shows the separation system of FIG. 1 after the taking up of the plastic card, and

FIGS. 3, 4 and 5 show various steps of taking up and separating a plastic card by means of the separation system of FIG. 1.

FIG. 1 and FIG. 2 show a machine 100 for processing plastic cards C that has a chassis on which there are fixed a separation system 150 and a reservoir 160 upstream of said separation system 150 and intended to contain a stack of plastic cards C to be processed.

For reasons of simplification of FIGS. 1 and 2, only the elements related to the system 150 for separating plastic cards C have been shown, but the chassis also carries at least one processing module mounted downstream of the separation system 150 and preferably a reception magazine downstream of the processing module or modules.

The separation system 150 is designed to separate the plastic card C from the bottom of the stack, that is to say it takes up the bottom plastic card C0 that is underneath the stack. In the remainder of the description, the bottom plastic card C0 is the one that is under the stack.

FIG. 1 shows the processing machine 100 before the bottom plastic card C0 is taken up by the separation system 150 and FIG. 2 shows the processing machine 100 after the bottom plastic card C0 has been taken up by the separation system 150 and has thus been separated from the rest of the stack.

The separation system 150 has a loading roller 152, a movable assembly 154 that is disposed above the loading roller 152 and a return means 156.

The movable assembly 154 comprises a base 158 and a loading wheel 159 mounted so as to be free to rotate on the base 158 that is here subjected to the return means 156. The base 158 takes the form of a cover inside which the loading wheel 159 is mounted.

The movable assembly 154, and more particularly the base 158, are mounted on the chassis, and are able to move vertically with respect to the loading roller 152 between a contact position (FIG. 1) in which the loading wheel 159 is in contact with the loading roller 152 and a separated position (FIG. 2) in which the loading wheel 159 is at a distance from the loading roller 152.

The contact position corresponds to the case where no plastic card C is between the loading roller 152 and the loading wheel 159, and the separated position corresponds to the case where the bottom plastic card C0 is between the loading roller 152 and the loading wheel 159.

The movable assembly 154 is constrained in the contact position by the return means 156, which for example takes the form of a spring.

Each plastic card C has a first end C1 and a second end C2. The first end C1 comes into contact with the separation system 150 and the second end C2 is at a distance from the separation system 150 and rests on a support 162 of the reservoir 160. The first end C1 of the bottom plastic card C0 rests on the loading roller 152.

To facilitate the separation of the plastic cards C, the support 162 has an inclined slope 164 that advances towards the separation system 150 while descending. Thus, when the bottom plastic card C0 is taken up by the separation system 150, the second end C2 of this bottom plastic card C0 descends while following the inclined slope 162 as it advances (FIG. 2) until it reaches a horizontal position.

The friction between the bottom plastic card C0 and the plastic card C just above are thus attenuated and the flat friction between them becomes a linear friction. The mechanical friction braking and the electrostatic braking are almost cancelled and the bottom plastic card C0 is then easier to load.

FIG. 3 shows the separation system 150 before the bottom plastic card C0 is taken up, FIG. 4 shows the start of the taking up of the bottom plastic card C0 by the separation system 150 and FIG. 5 shows the separation system 150 when the bottom plastic card C0 is entirely taken up.

The loading roller 152 has at least one groove 304 that extends parallel to the axis of the loading roller 152, over the periphery of the loading roller 152 and over its entire length.

Before the bottom plastic card C0 is taken up, the loading roller 152 is at rest and the first end C1 of the bottom plastic card C0 rests on top whereas the loading wheel 159 is in abutment on the loading roller 152.

The base 158 has an upstream wall 302 that extends upstream of the loading wheel 159 with respect to the direction of advance of the plastic cards C towards the processing modules and here substantially vertically. The upstream wall 302 extends here on each side of the loading wheel 159.

In the contact position and when the end C1 of the bottom plastic card C0 rests on the periphery of the loading roller 152, the bottom end of the upstream wall 302, that is to say the end that is closest to the loading roller 152, is at a distance “d” from the loading roller 152 that is less than the thickness of the bottom plastic card CO.

FIG. 2 shows that, when a plastic card C is to be processed, the loading roller 152 is rotated (arrow 402) in the direction of advance of the plastic cards C.

Each groove 304 has an opening and a depth sufficient to enable the first end C1 of the bottom plastic card C0 to descend (arrow 404) into said groove 304 so that its first end C1 passes under the bottom end of the upstream wall 302.

The opening and the depth do however remain such that, despite the drop of the first end C1 of the bottom plastic card C0, the other first ends C1 of the other plastic card C remain in abutment behind the upstream wall 302 and cannot pass under its bottom end.

Thus it is not necessary to adjust the separation system 150 and, whatever the thickness of the plastic cards C used, only the bottom plastic card C0 is driven by the loading roller 152 while the others remain blocked, thus achieving an optimum separation system 150.

FIG. 5 shows that the bottom plastic card C0 is taken up when the loading roller 152 rotates (402), and that the other plastic cards C remain in abutment behind the upstream wall 302, preventing multiple taking up.

The loading roller 152 drives the bottom plastic card C0 by friction and the movable assembly 154 rises and passes to the separated position by action of the bottom plastic card C0 on the loading wheel 159.

As soon as the first end C1 of the bottom plastic card C0 is taken up by the downstream processing module, the loading roller 152 is stopped and the bottom plastic card C0 continues to advance because of the means provided for this purpose in said processing module. When the second end C2 of the bottom plastic card CO leaves the separation system 150, the movable assembly 154 returns to the contact position as presented in FIG. 1, and the plastic cards C remain in abutment behind the upstream wall 302, and the new bottom plastic card C0 is then ready to be taken up.

The thicknesses of the plastic cards C used lie between 0.5 mm and 0.76 mm.

According to a particular embodiment of the invention, the loading roller 152 is produced from a flexible material that adheres to the plastic cards C, such as for example EPDM.

According to an even more particular embodiment, for cards 0.5 mm and 0.76 mm thick, the diameter of the loading roller 152 is around 20 mm, and each groove has a depth of around 0.6 mm and an opening of around 0.8 mm.

Naturally the present invention is not limited to the examples and embodiments described and depicted but is capable of numerous variants accessible to persons skilled in the art. 

1. System for separating a bottom plastic card from a stack of plastic cards, comprising: a loading roller on which a first end of a bottom plastic card rests, and having at least one groove extending parallel to the axis of said loading roller, on its periphery and over its entire length, a movable assembly disposed above the loading roller and comprising a base and a loading wheel mounted free to rotate on the base, said base being able to move vertically between a contact position in which the loading wheel is in contact with the loading roller and a separated position in which the loading wheel is at a distance from the loading roller, and a return means designed to constrain said movable assembly in the contact position, the base having an upstream wall that extends upstream of the loading wheel and the bottom end of which is, in the contact position, at a distance from the loading roller less than the thickness of the bottom plastic card, and the or each groove an opening and a depth sufficient to enable the first end of the bottom plastic card to descend in said groove so that its first end passes under the bottom end of the upstream wall, the opening and the depth however remaining such that, despite the drop of the first end of the bottom plastic card, the first ends of the other plastic cards remain in abutment behind the upstream wall.
 2. Machine for processing plastic cards, comprising a chassis on which there are mounted a reservoir containing a stack of plastic cards to be processed, at least one processing module intended to process each plastic card, and a separation system according to claim 1 and disposed between the reservoir and the or one of the processing modules.
 3. Processing machine according to claim 2, wherein the second ends of the plastic cards rest on a support of the reservoir that has an inclined slope that advances towards the separation system while descending. 